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Ultrahuman raises $70m with Qualcomm as Oura's IPO exposes a wide valuation gap

The Indian smart ring maker is reportedly priced at $365m, a small fraction of its larger rival. The round is a bet that rings can become computers, and that a patent fight is behind it.

· · 6 min read
Watercolour for: Ultrahuman raises $70m with Qualcomm as Oura's IPO exposes a wide valuation gap
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Ultrahuman, the Bengaluru smart ring company, said on Thursday, September 3, that it had raised $70m from a group that includes Qualcomm Ventures, the diagnostics group Labcorp, Alpha Wave, Blume Ventures, Nexus Venture Partners and Alteria Capital. According to TechCrunch, a person familiar with the matter put the valuation at $365m, roughly three times the $120m at which the company was valued in 2023. Mohit Kumar, the founder and chief executive, told the publication that the money consists of $65m of primary equity and $5m of debt.

The timing is pointed. On the same day Oura, the Finnish market leader that has spent the past year using patent law to keep Ultrahuman out of American shops, filed publicly for its initial public offering. The two companies now sit at opposite ends of the same category: one preparing to ask public investors for a valuation reported at around $16bn, the other raising a modest round from strategic backers at a price that is a small fraction of that. The question for investors is whether the gap reflects a durable difference in quality, or a temporary discount imposed by a legal fight that Ultrahuman believes it has engineered its way around.

What the money buys

The headline partner is Qualcomm. Ultrahuman told TechCrunch it is working with the chipmaker on a new ring built on Qualcomm silicon, while continuing to use the Nordic Semiconductor chips in its current products. The aim is to run more software on the ring itself rather than relying on a paired phone or the cloud. Mr Kumar describes today's rings as trackers and wants the next generation to behave more like a small computer: a pointer, a game controller, a car key, an interface for AI assistants, and a platform for third-party developers. Some of those functions are due to arrive through a software update to the existing Ring Air and Ring Pro by the end of September.

In its own announcement, reported by Android Central, the company framed the round as the moment it moves from being a wearable health business to what it calls a human-computer interface company built around the body. That is ambitious language for a $70m raise, but the commercial logic is clear. A ring that only reports sleep and heart rate competes on price and accuracy against Oura and a growing list of cheaper rivals. A ring that does things, and invites developers to build for it, could earn a platform premium.

Labcorp's participation points in a different direction. TechCrunch reports that the two companies are exploring whether blood-flow signals captured by the ring, combined with laboratory blood test data, could help identify risks in cardiovascular health, fertility and ageing. That is a slower, clinical path, but one with more defensible economics if it produces validated tests that insurers or physicians will pay for.

The numbers behind the price

Ultrahuman disclosed more than many private companies do. It says its annual revenue run rate is about $140m, up roughly 45 per cent from a year earlier, and that it aims for $200m by January 2027. It has sold about 800,000 rings, up from about 700,000 in February. Around 12 per cent of users pay for PowerPlugs, its add-on software features. The United States contributed about 45 per cent of revenue in the current quarter and India about 11 per cent, according to Pulse 2.0, which summarised the reported figures.

On those figures, the reported valuation is about 2.6 times the current run rate, by our arithmetic. Oura's filing, as reported by TechCrunch, shows revenue of $1.2bn for the nine months to June 30, up from $697m a year earlier, with 3.6m rings sold over the past year and about 5m paying members. A valuation near $16bn on that base implies a multiple several times higher than Ultrahuman's. Some of the difference is earned: Oura is far larger, has a subscription business with reported 12-month retention of about 85 per cent, and is growing faster in percentage terms. But a gap of that size also tells you how heavily investors have discounted Ultrahuman's legal exposure in its largest market.

Profitability is the other soft spot. Mr Kumar said the company may not be profitable this year because it is spending on physical stores, branding and clinical studies. He also said Ultrahuman wants to show about eight quarters of profitability before listing, and sees 2028 as the earliest window for an IPO.

The patent fight that shaped the round

The discount has a specific origin. In August 2025 the US International Trade Commission issued a limited exclusion order in an investigation brought by Oura, covering smart rings that infringe claims of Oura's US patent 11,868,178. Android Authority reported in October 2025 that the orders had become final after the presidential review period, effectively barring Ultrahuman from importing and selling its rings in the United States. RingConn, another rival caught in the same case, chose to settle and take a licence from Oura. Ultrahuman chose to redesign.

That decision paid off in March, when US Customs and Border Protection ruled that the redesigned Ring Pro is not subject to the exclusion order, subject to a certification process. Ultrahuman returned to the American market with the new ring this year. Mr Kumar told TechCrunch that US demand currently runs at 18 to 20 times available supply, that he expects US sales to return to their previous level as soon as next quarter, and that he aims to triple them over the following four quarters as production rises.

Two caveats apply. First, a customs ruling is not the end of patent risk: it covers a single patent, it can be challenged, and Oura has shown it is willing to litigate. Second, supply that lags demand by a factor of 18 is a sign of interest, but also a reminder that the company has not yet proven it can manufacture at the scale its targets require.

Why strategic money matters here

Apart from Alpha Wave, the investor list leans on strategic and regional backers rather than the large funds that dominate AI rounds this year. That is not necessarily a weakness. Qualcomm brings silicon and a reason to want a credible ring platform outside the Apple and Samsung ecosystems. Labcorp brings a route to clinical validation. For a hardware startup whose main constraint is supply and whose main risk is legal, partners that can help with components and evidence may be worth more than a higher headline price.

Our view

Ultrahuman's round is a disciplined raise at an honest price, and that is its main virtue. The company has accepted a valuation that reflects the damage done by months outside the American market, and has taken money from partners who can help it fix specific problems rather than from investors who would demand a story to justify a richer mark. The bet on rings as computers is the speculative part. Nobody has yet shown that consumers want to control games or cars with a ring, and developer ecosystems for small devices have a poor record. The Labcorp work is less glamorous but more likely to create lasting value. For founders in consumer hardware, the lesson is that intellectual property is a balance sheet item: a single patent kept Ultrahuman's rings out of its largest market for months. For investors, the signals to watch are whether US sales really recover by year end, whether the Qualcomm ring ships on time, and how Oura's shares are priced. A strong Oura debut would make Ultrahuman's current valuation look like a bargain; a weak one would suggest the whole category was priced too generously.

Sources

Filed under Startups. Written by Invest Times Editorial under our editorial standards. Commentary and analysis for information only, not investment advice.

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